Kartar’s being tailed by a very large Russian. The Chinese Ministry of State Security thinks Kartar stole their Semtex to blow up Trump’s wall. Mr. Cherneski is reversing Kartar’s organizational transformation. And Kartar agonizes for a way to overcome his management’s cognitive biases.

The writing of Agile Grande continues:

You can read what’s been written at LeanPub for free. Get a copy now because maybe later I’ll charge a MINT! For the best reading experience, I recommend reading epubs with an iPad using Apple’s Books (Books used to be called iBooks).

More about Chapter 3:

The hero, Kartar, realizes he’ll never get management to stop undoing his organizational change work until he finds a tool to break through preconceived biases. He starts working on an idea that he needs to use a visual system of analysis to switch people’s brains from the slap dash system one thinking to the more rational system two, but he gets interrupted by a large stranger who has followed him from Long Beach California to a container ship in the Arabian Sea.

Mr. Cherneksy, the VP who is making millions by taking advantage of his organization’s complexity, prepares his son, Studebaker, to help him use this new Agile transformation to his advantage. Cherneski also discovers that Kartar’s daughter is dating his son.

And then there is Dharma, Kartar’s daughter. It turns out she is “raising the bar” on the amount of trouble a daughter can bring to her father.

Another complication shows its teeth…

The Ministry of State Security watches the news too and they aren’t happy about the negative attention about PLA (People’s Liberation Army) Semtex that found its way to the USA and blew up their president’s favorite infrastructure project: a wall between the US and Mexico. So they’ve put their best dachshund on the job: Daxian. (Pronounced “Dah-she-an”.) This agent, an expert of geomancy, is hot on Kartar’s trail and has a Chinese destroyer at her beck and call.

What could go wrong?

Remember Star Wars THE EMPIRE STRIKES BACK? When at the end, Luke loses his hand, C3PO gets blow to pieces, and Han Solo gets frozen in carbonate? Chapter 3 is that moment. And by the end of this chapter, you’re going to be left wondering if Kartar will even get a chapter 4.

What’s to come if Kartar lives to see chapter 4?

• More about Dharma’s secrets
• Kartar learns to use systems thinking in a social manner that overcomes biases
• Kartar learns why “whole product focus” is so important
• Kartar discovers how to solve multi-team agile (systems) problems (critical for enterprises wanting improve their delivery performance)

Podcasting to Radio is like Tivo to being stuck in the 1970s with big three TV networks.  With podcasts you can “stop the show” until you’re ready to continue or even “speed up the action” if the pace is too slow.  It’s like having ala carte cable where you get to pick the show you want to watch, when you want to watch it.  And if you don’t know what to pick, you can type into a search engine, “favorite topic” and podcast and find what you want.

When I’m driving in my car, I’m listening to podcasts. When I’m waiting at the school or bus stop, I’m listening to podcasts. It’s like Youtube, but even better–hands free! I’m free to go jogging, work in the yard, or just chill on the couch with a podcast.

Podcasting the convenient way

My preferred mode of listening means I’m not attached to my computer but using my smart phone. This way, I’ve always got my listens with me, whether I’m in my car or doing housework. Although iOS comes with a podcast player from Apple, my podcast player of choice is Overcast, which lets me speed up the playback if things aren’t moving at the rate that I like.

After installing any podcast player, your next mission is to use its search capability to find what you like. Just like a web search engine you just need to enter in some keywords like “science fiction” or “SciFi Thoughts.” Crusing in your car? Most cars have a USB port in to which you connect your phone. Common locations for in-vehicle USB ports: glove box and center console—the storage area between the seats.

Smart speakers are another route for listening in home. Here is another article that goes over a number of options.

Many smart TVs or BluRay players have app stores. Go search their app store for “podcast player.”

About Podcast Aggregators

Podcast aggregators send podcasts from the publisher’s site to your device.  Or, you can play the podcast directly on the aggregators webpage. Usually simple searching for “SciFi Thoughts” in your podcast player will get you where you need to go. But if you need more details, you can find SciFi Thoughts at the following links.

• Overcast.FM https://overcast.fm/itunes1352868789/scifi-thoughts
• Stitcher https://www.stitcher.com/podcast/anoir-consulting/scifi-thoughts
• Player.fm https://player.fm/series/scifi-thoughts
• iTunes: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/scifi-thoughts/id1352868789
• Castbox: https://castbox.fm/channel/SciFi-Thoughts%7D-id1185863?country=us
• Listen Notes: https://www.listennotes.com/podcasts/scifi-thoughts-lancer-kind-science-fiction-pgtOy3P1C5s/
• Spotify: https://podcasters.spotify.com/podcast/2kM3jyq6qQQ4bnGF7eyXby/overview

The writing of Agile Grande continues. For now, you can read for free on LeanPub. Get it now because maybe later I’ll charge a MINT!

I’m quite taken at how fluid and clear the ePub file works on iBook readers (Mac, iPhone, Android, …). I hope your reading experience is enjoyable as well.

So what does Agile Grande have to do with Trump’s border wall? Check out chapters one and two to get in the know. There are systems all around us that are affecting us everyday. If you can’t see the big picture then you’ll be many steps behind.

In this chapter, Kartar ends up working with Studebaker, Mr. Cherneski’s son. Together they discover a lead that points to a problem with order management, a system under Cherneski’s leadership. Through working with Studebaker on a report, Kartar discovers the hairy politics of doing organizational change with a company leadership who is mostly interested in assigning blame. Kartar argues over how to be transparent in a report for the company vice presidents. Studebaker isn’t willing to document anything that could cause controversy. Although Kartar insists on digging deeper into the incident, at the last minute, Cherneski has told Kartar to forget about it and sends him on a trip to a seaport in Dubai.

What’s upcoming for Chapter 3: a shipboard ‘accident’ puts Kartar’s life in danger and a beautiful, mysterious woman hunts Kartar using an ancient form of systems thinking.

I can’t wait to write it!

Lancer

Chapter one is up for free on Leanpub. Quick! Go download it before I come to my senses!

In chapter one, the story opens with CIA operatives planning how to accept a delivery of something they don’t want anyone to know about. It’s a black operation and although it’s supposed be a milk run, malfunctioning crane automation at the Long Beach sea port almost spills the beans. (Well, something does get spilled but I leave that to you to read about.) A logistics company operates the port and one of their VPs, Mr. Cherneski, gets a call from his darknet customer who expresses displeasure at the near disaster. Our Scrum Master and hero Kartar gets a call too, but it’s from port operations since it’s his teams developing the sea port’s automation. By the end of the chapter, whatever the CIA was smuggling in was used to destroy a portion of the wall between Mexico and the US.

What’s upcoming in Chapter 2: Kartar gets a taste of the politics that happen with organizational change. He is charged with writing a report to get to the bottom of the crane incident at Port of Long Beach Sea Port, and it’s due by end of day.

Do you find thrillers, well thrilling? Then why not learn how to scale Scrum across an enterprise in an international thriller?

AGILE GRANDE is being written in a continuous delivery style on LeanPub. Chapters are going up as they are written and revised at https://leanpub.com/AgileGrande.

AGILE GRANDE is the sequel to AGILE NOIR. Kartar Patel,  a savvy Scrum Master charged with scaling Agile across an international logistics company who’s organizational structure is ill suited. Although ill suited for Agile it’s right suited for Mr. Cherneski, a selfish genius who masterminded an organization of siloed pigeon holes so employees unknowingly support his multi million dollar darknet business. Kartar doesn’t know why his transformation work is being resisted at every turn until he’s left for dead in the Indian Ocean and hunted by a foreign intelligence agency. Kartar washes ashore in Mumbai without his memory and has to go underground. He learns tools to analyze and adjust organizational structures. By the time he recovers from amnesia, he has only twenty-four hours to stop his daughter from marrying Cherneski’s son and get his Agile transformation back on track.

What’s a good servant leader to do other than get to work and save the day?